The refrigerator door was still slightly ajar, the interior light casting a weak yellow glow across the empty shelves.
I went into my small office at the back of the apartment.
I sat at my desk and pulled the black security camera hard drive from the metal bracket under the low shelf. My hands were stiff from the cold.
While the laptop booted up, I checked the digital utility bill on my phone. An alert caught my eye.
There was a second phone line active on our family plan. It had been added three weeks ago, registered under Chloe’s name but billed directly to my credit card.
I wrote the ten-digit number down on a yellow legal pad.
The video player loaded, showing the gray grid of our living room from five days ago.
I dragged the cursor back to the afternoon after I left for Munich, watching the timestamp on the bottom of the screen.
